


Turn Left

by SegaBarrett



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-10-05 03:38:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17317379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SegaBarrett/pseuds/SegaBarrett
Summary: Jesse doesn't believe Walt about Brock.





	Turn Left

**Author's Note:**

  * For [abysque](https://archiveofourown.org/users/abysque/gifts).



> Disclaimer: I don't own Breaking Bad, and I make no money from this.

He held the gun against Mr. White’s forehead, watching the imprint form, a bruise crossing over his skin.

“Jesse, I never even met these people before.”

Jesse swallowed. The words felt comforting in an odd way; Mr. White was only looking out for him. He wanted what was best for him; he would never hurt Brock. That made sense.

But in the back of his mind, creeping up his spine like a chill in winter, were the words that Mr. White had said to him before he went to Mexico. The way his voice had made him sound like Mr. White hadn’t wanted him to come back alive.

Had he been disappointed? Had he wanted Jesse to come back in a box so that he could prove that the student would never out-do the master?

Jesse didn’t know, didn’t care to know. He loved the man in front of him; there were ways that Mr. White had understood him that his parents never had and that they never would. He had given him something that he had so desperately needed in his life.

But… 

(Jesse, put down the gun.) Not his voice in his head, but Mr. White’s, stern and commanding. 

He didn’t want to put down he gun, though. Because he heard another voice in his head, the firm and sure voice of Gus.

(Don’t allow him to lie to you, Jesse. You know how he can be.)

He remembered sitting across from Gus at dinner. Driving Gus and Mike to safety.

Being terrified that Mike was going to bleed out and die right there, in Mexico.

And Mr. White would have just left him there. Who was more likely to do something out of spite, to try to hurt Jesse? Who was more likely to try to punish him?

(You and your little junkie girlfriend…)

Maybe if he had a chance to talk to Gus, he could figure all of it out. Everything Gus said made sense most of the time, even if it took Jesse a while to figure out the point he was trying to make sometimes. Gus saw something in him, and now that Mr. White had been fired, Gus needed him as his only cook. But would he try to cement that allegiance by hurting Jesse’s family? A way to keep him under his thumb, maybe?

But if Brock died… If Brock died from ricin, Jesse knew he would fall apart and be useless in the lab or anywhere else. He would never be okay again. Gus had no use for a broken cook, a rash cook that would do rash things out of anger.

He looked back at the man whose forehead he had made a red indent on, the man whose life was his to take or give.

“Leave,” Jesse snarled. If he looked at him once more, he might do it, might pull the trigger. The curtain was down, and it had all been a powerplay, another one. Who knew how much Mr. White had been in control of everything, from the beginning?

“What? Jesse, what?” Mr. White asked, and Jesse felt a flash of fury go through him. He could kill him – it would be so easy to just leave him on the ground and walk away. He had killed Gale, he had killed a man in Mexico. It wasn’t something that would slow him down anymore if he decided not to let it. It would prove to Gus that he was loyal, loyal to the right man.

Mike would be proud of him for doing what had to be done. He would tell him not to look back, not to worry about his old connections. At least, that was what Jesse thought he would say.

“It was you, and I know it was you…” Jesse hissed. “How could you do it? And try to blame Gus? Did you really think you would have me eating out of the palm of your hand, like that? Come on, Mr. White, I might be dumb but I’m not nearly as dumb as you think I am…”

“Jesse…”

“I don’t want to hear it! Not one, more, goddamned word from you….”

“Jesse…”

Jesse howled, pointing the gun upwards and firing, watching as the bullet lodged itself in the ceiling.

“The next one… goes in your head.” 

Walter White rose, getting up and walking away. 

“Get the fuck out of here and don’t ever come back,” Jesse whispered, all over again.

***

“You appear distracted.”

Gus’ voice cut in as Jesse stared at the red floor, remembering the blood that had spotted it. He had saved Mr. White from ending up there too, but to what end? He might end up there too, before the day was over in fact.

“Brock’s in the hospital,” he admitted.

“Your family,” Gus said, and Jesse let out a sigh. He had been waiting for those words, had been waiting for them from Mr. White and had never gotten them. He wondered if Gus had a family – if he did, he never talked about them. Jesse didn’t know if he could or should ask. He had already told him too much; this man could not be his friend. He had to have learned his lesson with Mr. White. He couldn’t get too close.

He had to have learned his lesson now that he had killed Gale.

“My family,” Jesse echoed instead. “This batch should be done soon…”

It was a lot more work with only him. There wasn’t anyone to talk to or sulk at or complain about except when Gus came in to visit.

But Jesse also found that he didn’t really want to talk much anymore as the days turned to weeks turned to months; while Brock got stronger and got out of the hospital.

“A toxin called Lily of the Valley. A common case of childhood poisoning – it’s good that you caught it as quickly as you did,” the doctor had told them. “The berries… They’re sweet. Sometimes kids don’t know what is good for them and what can hurt them, so it’s always good to keep an eye on them outdoors, as much as you can.”

He heard the chastisement in the words and took them to heart. 

Children weren’t the only ones who didn’t always know what was good for them.

***

“You’ve been quiet, kid. I don’t know if I like it or if I should be worried.”

Jesse looked up at Mike’s words and rubbed his hand over his eyes. He hadn’t wanted to think about Mr. White, not now, not today.

“I was just thinking. And I would have thought that you would like me being more quiet… You always get tired of hearing me go on and on, don’t you?”

“You look like you’re getting sick, kid. That isn’t good.”

“What did you do with him, anyway?”

Mike paused and turned his head towards Jesse.

“Did to who?”

Jesse narrowed his eyes at him.

“You know who,” he said, “Did you kill him? Dump him? After I stopped… stopping you?”

“Walter’s alive. As you demanded. Our boss always keeps his promises, Jesse.”

“But wasn’t he a problem?”

“Not as big a problem as if we didn’t have you. You have Walter’s talent without his liability.”

Jesse didn’t know what to say about that.

***

He went to the jeweler’s and bought a ring, a pretty sparkling one that he thought matched Andrea’s eyes, and he proposed.

They were married in the middle of the spring. He tried not to flinch when they suggested lilies in the bouquet at the reception.

They were surrounded by people, and Jesse didn’t know most of them. They sang a lot, and danced.

Gus paid for everything.

“It’s important to give your wife’s family a good first impression, Jesse. You must show that you are willing to spend money on important things.”

Jesse wanted to reply that he was, but that he wasn’t sure if that was what Andrea wanted, that maybe she just wanted something small, but it was better not to tell Gus that.

With Gus, it seemed better to just nod and go along with his plan, since he seemed to know best. Gus seemed to have known everything and done everything, and it only seemed right to invite him there and have him standing beside him as his best man.

Jesse tried to smile, tried to stop looking at Brock as if he would vanish into vapor if he took his eyes off him for too long.

What if the cartel came for him, one night late, knowing he was the one who had killed one of Don Eladio’s men? 

It got harder for him to sleep. He stayed awake at night, staring at the ceiling.

Andrea stopped asking him so many questions after a while. 

***

“When did you decide?” Jesse asked Mike one day. They had been sitting in silence again, as they did more often than not these days. There was much less time for runs now that Jesse had had the lab full-time, but Mike still brought him out on dead-drops sometimes, maybe just to make sure Jesse got some air from time to time. He would stay in the lab most of the time, even when a batch wasn’t due. It was better than wanting to talk to Andrea but not being able to, wanting to run and being unable to stop being rooted to the spot.

“Decide what?” Mike asked.

“What you were going to do. Which side you were going to be on?”

“The world isn’t sides, kid. It’s not always black and white, no matter how much you might want it to be. But you’re a good person.”

Jesse snorted.

“I don’t believe that.”

“Good people usually don’t.”

***

“You are necessary, Jesse.”

Jesse looked up into Gus’ face and let his shoulders sag, his eyes wide but only vaguely seeing. 

He had blinked and ten years had gone by. Gus was still on top – the cartel had been in shambles and as soon as it had tried to rebuild itself, Gus had found a way to crush it again.

Jesse pretended very well that he slept peacefully.

He had seen Mr. White’s obituary in the paper years and years ago. It called him a loving husband and father, who always valued teaching his students more than anything else.

Jesse had laid flowers on his grave. Roses, not lilies of the valley.

Mike had made it five years after that, and Jesse had been at his side for all of them. 

And now Gus, standing before him calmly telling him about the lung infection he had picked up while making big deals overseas.

Wanting to leave Jesse the keys to his kingdom “to plan for any eventuality”.

Yet Gus seemed immortal, like the Highlander, or maybe the Terminator, made of stone. It was hard to imagine Gus being frightened or sad about anything at all.

It was hard to remember what it had been like when he had felt those things, too.

“I’ll do it,” he managed, with a slow nod.

“You will make me proud.”

Jesse waited until Gus left him alone, alone with cameras and whispers as he always was, before he even tried to cry.

He found that he couldn’t.

Hail to the king. 

**The End**


End file.
